Chinese Satellite Reportedly Grappled, Moved Another Spacecraft Away From Orbit

© AP Photo

Kirill Kurevlev

Correspondent

All materialsWrite to the author

The event was discussed as part of a webinar on managing the risks of satellite close approaches in geostationary orbit, hosted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies and the Secure World Foundation earlier this week.

Last week, China reportedly demonstrated yet another advancement in space-based technology and capabilities as an analytics firm claimed to have seen a satellite "grab" another one and yank it from its orbit.

According to a Breaking Defense report upon the event, China's Shijian-21 satellite, or SJ-21, vanished from view on January 22 and resurfaced while performing a "large maneuver" to approach a dead BeiDou Navigation System satellite. The SJ-21 then yanked the BeiDou from its orbit and deposited it in a "graveyard orbit" a few hundred kilometers away, where it is unlikely to interact with or collide with live satellites.

Graveyard orbit is typically classified as 300 kilometers above geostationary orbit, or around 36,000 kilometers above the ground.

The information was reportedly presented by Brian Flewelling, chief architect for space situational awareness (SSA) at ExoAnalytic Solutions, who showed footage from the event.

"We continue to track SJ-21 and monitor it for conjunctions with all known space objects. The ability to maintain custody of SJ-21 after this large daytime maneuver is an important and unique capability of Exo’s commercial SSA network," Flewelling is quoted as saying.

The latest tracking data acquired earlier this week from ExoAnalytic's telescopes shows the SJ-21 separating from the BeiDou, leaving the latter in the eccentric "super-graveyard drift orbit," Flewelling told the outlet after the event.

SJ-21 has now reportedly returned to a near-geostationary orbit.

“What we know for sure is what we can observe by its actions in space — the intent behind it and what China plans to do with this technology is a more subjective assessment,” he added.

The "gap" in observations was reportedly caused by the fact that it docked with the now-defunct satellite during the day when telescopes are unable to image.

According to the report, the SJ-21 maneuver is consistent with the US initiative of On-Orbit Servicing, Assembly, and Manufacturing (OSAM) capabilities, which the US and Europe have also pursued. Such missions would reportedly come within Space Command's operations and might be a factor in future Artemis program launches.

"Artemis is about more than getting back to the Moon; it’s about sustained human presence on the Moon and the ultimate goal of going to Mars," Larry Huebner, NASA technical lead for OSAM-2 said at the event, per Fox News.

The SJ-21 was reportedly supposed to "test and verify space debris mitigation technologies," but the ability to shift satellites around signifies that China has alarming capabilities for orbital manipulation of other nations' satellites, according to US experts.

Also at the webinar, CSIS, the Secure World Foundation, and the University of Texas at Austin introduced a new web-based project to watch real-time and forecast movements of satellites and space debris, with the goal of improving transparency about close approaches in orbit.

An OSAM-capable vehicle may ultimately be equipped with a 3D printer to generate new pieces for production in space, allowing space vehicles to achieve remarkable capabilities. The US reportedly intends to launch a "servicer" satellite in 2025.

Rising settler violence against Palestinians in Burqa reignites struggle over land

Residents of the West Bank village have been fighting to reclaim their land since 1978 when Israel confiscated it to establish the Homesh settlement

Mushir Seif, a Palestinian resident of Burqa, has been for decades denied access to his land which is only 10 minutes away by foot (MEE/Atef Daglas)

By Atef Daglas in Nablus, 

Occupied Palestine
Published date: 29 January 2022

Perched atop the roof of his home in Burqa village north of Nablus in the occupied West Bank stands Mushir Seif, gazing across the Mount of al-Zuhur at his land, now swallowed up by the Israeli settlement of Homesh.

The land is only 800 meters away from him, and 10 minutes away by foot, yet for over four decades he’s been denied access to it.

Seif and his 6,000 fellow Burqa residents have not been able to reclaim or plant anywhere in the 45 dunams (45,000 square metres) of their land that have been confiscated by Israel since 1978 when Homesh was established.

Israel uses settler violence as 'tool' to take Palestinian land: B'Tselem

Read More »

With a mixture of sadness and bitterness, Seif told Middle East Eye of the pain he and his fellow villagers have felt for decades due to the settler presence on the land - with the tacit support of the Israeli army - and the persistent feeling of insecurity caused by settler violence.

“It was an ambush by the settlers,” Seif told MEE about one near-fatal attack that he and other villagers came under last November.

“The army was conspicuously absent and did not come even after the attack,” he added.

The incident Seif referred to happened on 15 November when a group of Burqa residents was on their way to visit their stolen land. When they arrived, Homesh settlers shot at them, assaulted them with sharp objects, and destroyed Seif’s car. At least six farmers were seriously injured.

The November assault was not an isolated incident. Palestinians in Burqa fear that settlers are ramping up violence to create a new reality on the ground and force the government to give them the land.

Attacks increased particularly after the killing of an Israeli settler by Palestinian gunmen in December near Homesh, bringing the decade-long fight over land in Burqa back into the spotlight.

Struggle through the generations

The plight of Palestinians in Burqa started in 1978 when Israel confiscated 1,050 dunams from Mounts al-Zuhur and al-Qubaybat in the village to establish a military base.

The military outpost was soon transformed into what is known as the Homesh settlement, whose radius of control extends to 4,000 dunams.

In 2005, the Israeli government under Ariel Sharon evacuated settlers from Homesh, along with settlers in the Gaza Strip and five other settlements and military bases near Jenin, as part of its unilateral disengagement plan.

Since then, the army has closed off the area for the Palestinians that owned the land while settlers continued to come back to maintain their presence, establishing a makeshift yeshiva, or religious seminary, in contravention of Israeli law.


From 1978 up to the present day, the tussle between settlers and the Palestinians who own the land has been ongoing, a struggle passed down from grandparents to grandchildren.

Such is the case of the family of Yousef Hajji, known as Abu Saleh, who was expelled by the army while tilling the land 44 years ago. Abu Saleh passed away in 2005 aged 91 before he could return to his property.

His son Fathallah, 72, faced a similar situation a few years ago when he tried to plant trees on the land and was expelled by Israel. Now, the same fate has befallen his grandson, Nasser, who was wounded in the settler attack in November.

Standing beside his son, Nasser, as he received treatment for his wounds at the Rafidia Surgical Hospital in Nablus, Fathallah told MEE that Nasser had gone with dozens of his fellow villagers to visit and plant the land.

The visit was arranged to comply with a request by the Israeli High Court, which asked for proof that demonstrates the villagers' inability to access the land due to settler attacks.

'When we were ambushed, the settlers attacked us from behind and from the front, and the army was nowhere to be found' - Munir Qadus, Yesh Din

Settlers and the army had testified in front of the court saying farmers do not ever visit the land and hence cannot lay claim to it.

The attack was not the first of its kind in Burqa, Fathallah said, but it was the most violent.

About 50 settlers had been lying in wait for them and attacked them with sharp objects once they approached the land.

Munir Qadus, a field researcher with the Israeli human rights organisation Yesh Din, was one of those assaulted on the day when his phone was broken and his glasses were lost.

“We waited for over 15 minutes for the army to arrive to secure the entrance of the farmers to their lands, despite the security coordination from the side of the Palestinian Authority (PA),” Qadus told MEE.

“When we were ambushed, the settlers attacked us from behind and from the front, and the army was nowhere to be found.”

About 50 similar settler attacks were documented in 2020 alone, Qadus said, which included beatings, attacks on homes, and stone-throwing against Palestinians passing by in their cars.

Court orders ignored

In 2013, after many lawsuits filed by the farmers, the Israeli High Court ruled that Homesh was a private Palestinian landholding belonging to its farmers and that an Israeli presence there was not permissible.

In breach of the court order, settlers maintained a de facto outpost on the lands.

Burqa residents have been able to enter their lands at times since 2018, but only fleetingly and without planting anything.

On the rare occasion that they could plant certain trees on the lands through aid and charitable organisations, settlers would promptly uproot them and fill the water-wells with rocks.

Settlers in Homesh pictured in November, the same month a group of Palestinians were ambushed and assaulted (Provided/Munir Qadus)

Jehad Salah, former head of the Burqa Village Council, told MEE that the only reasonable explanation for the settlers’ continuing presence in Homesh is the implicit approval of the army and government.

Qadus accuses the government and the army of negligence in implementing the law, asserting that neither the settlers nor the army abide by the court order, which is the highest legal body in Israel.

“They think that all of the land is Israeli land,” Qadus said.

Israel: Settler attacks on Palestinian olive harvest 'most dangerous in years'

Read More »

Settler attacks on Palestinians across the occupied West Bank have seen an “alarming” rise in 2021, UN human rights experts said in a statement last year.

“We are witnessing the highest recorded levels of violence in recent years and more severe incidents,” the statement said.

According to UN figures, 370 settler attacks led to damage to property in 2021 and a further 126 assaults caused casualties.

At the same time, settlement building has tripled from the previous year, with the approval of the construction of 4,000 new units, according to Khalil al-Tafkaji, Palestinian expert on settlement and director of the map unit at the Centre for Arab Studies in Jerusalem.

Both authorised and unauthorised Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian land are considered illegal under international law.
'We will not leave the mountain'

Following the shooting near Homesh that left one settler dead and two wounded on 16 December, settlers unleashed a wave of attacks that have affected most of the village’s residents.

Dozens of houses have been assaulted and their windows and doors broken, threatening the lives of many villagers. Gravestones were not spared the onslaught and many of them were vandalised and defaced.

Saddam Salah, an anti-settlement activist in Burqa who regularly documents the violations on his camera, says at least 30 houses in Burqa were attacked in the three weeks after the December shooting. Settlers also used live bullets while attacking Palestinian homes, he said.

The situation has been exacerbated by the army’s crackdown on the village.

Military checkpoints have been erected around Burqa and its entrances have been blocked, leaving some neighbourhoods completely sectioned off and isolated.

A resurgence of popular resistance has emerged in Burqa in recent weeks and there have been protests against the deplorable conditions perpetrated by the army and the settlers.

Palestinians in Burqa are rising up against the attacks and incursions by the army and the settlers

 (MEE/Atef Daglas)

At least eight Palestinians have been injured by live bullets in demonstrations against the Israeli assaults, and hundreds more by rubber-coated steel bullets and tear gas.

Despite the soaring tensions in Homesh, the settlers continue their calls to “climb the mountain [of Homesh],” refusing to give up their position, citing religious reasons.

But the people of Burqa, the rightful owners of the land, promise that they will not remain silent.

With their oft-repeated slogan, “we will not leave the mountain,” they have created a counter popular resistance movement, alongside nearby villages of Beita and Kufr Qaddum, promising to protect their land and push back against turning Homesh into an Israeli settlement once more.

 

Surging Fertilizer Prices Set to Exacerbate African Food Crisis

Mumbi Gitau, Bloomberg News

(Bloomberg) -- A surge in global fertilizer prices is adding to worries about food security across sub-Saharan Africa, where small-scale farmers depend largely on imports -- if they even use additional nutrients at all.

With prices tripling over the past 18 months, many farmers are considering whether to forgo purchases of fertilizers this year. That leaves a market long touted for its growth potential set to shrink by almost a third, according to Sebastian Nduva, program manager at researcher group AfricaFertilizer.Org. That could potentially curb cereals output by 30 million tons, enough to feed 100 million people, he said.

“We are likely to see a scenario where yields are depressed and this will mean that either the government will have to readjust their budgets and import food, or there will be food shortages,” Nduva said.

Sub-Saharan Africa already has the world’s lowest fertilizer application rates, averaging 12 kilograms per hectare compared with a global average of 110 kilograms. With usage set to fall as input costs rise, the threat to regional food security and political stability is growing, according to Alain Sy Traoré, director of agriculture and rural development at the ECOWAS Commission. 

That will increase the region’s dependence on imports at a time when food prices are near a record high. More than 20 million people across sub-Saharan Africa are already on the brink of famine, according to the World Food Programme. 

Soaring gas prices helped drive fertilizers higher last year, squeezing supply as increasing costs shuttered plants while producers introduced export restrictions. 

While fertilizer prices in the U.S. have eased, prices in Europe and the Middle East, the top suppliers to Africa, are yet to find any relief -- a gauge of western European prices for ammonia remains at a record. Tensions over Ukraine have also been pushing up natural gas prices this month and any escalation could drive fertilizer prices even higher.

The high costs have curbed output at some of the more than 100 fertilizer blending plants in sub-Saharan Africa, which largely depend on imports of the nutrient, Nduva said. Stockpiles of the nutrients are now dwindling after governments and traders delayed procurements in the hope that prices would fall.

Small scale farmers, who account for more than 70% of fertilizer consumption in the region, are hardest hit. Most lack access to finance that could help them withstand the spiking prices.

“Corn, rice, sorghum and millet growers are most vulnerable because they do not have such buffers and will be forced do without any nutrients when planting,” said Patrice Annequin, senior fertilizer market specialist at IFDC, which promotes affordable nutrient technologies. 

Yao Nabotena, a cotton farmer in Kokaha village in Ivory Coast, used just 33 bags of fertilizer this season, half the amount required on his seven-hectare plantation. 

Some sectors are in a stronger position to weather the market turmoil. Gains in cocoa and cotton will cushion some farmers in West Africa from the higher input costs, said Annequin.

African nations have also begun or are expanding production of fertilizer as part of plans to reduce reliance on imports from Europe and North America, which are sometimes unsuitable for the region’s soils. Investors from Morocco’s OCP Group to Africa’s richest person Aliko Dangote and Fertiplant East Africa are investing in operations to produce or improve delivery of fertilizer in countries including Nigeria, Ethiopia and Kenya.

Fertilizer demand in the region should bounce back in 2023 as prices come down. Still, even before the current squeeze, sub-Saharan Africa had barely reached half its consumption potential, according to AfricaFertilizer.Org. Higher application rates and better use of arable land could transform the market.

“Meeting any of these parameters could double the region’s fertilizer consumption,” Nduva said.

©2022 Bloomberg L.P.

Waymo sues California DMV to keep robotaxi safety details secret

Sandeen said a distinction should be made between trade secrets and plain secrecy.

A Waymo self-driving test vehicle in Mountain View, California.

 (Yichuan Cao / TNS)

Russ Mitchell
Los Angeles Times

Jan. 28, 2022 

Waymo, the driverless car company operating an autonomous taxi fleet in San Francisco, is suing the California Department of Motor Vehicles. The immediate issue: whether the company, owned by Google parent Alphabet, can hide from the public safety-related information by designating it as a trade secret.

The topics Waymo wants to keep hidden include how it plans to handle driverless car emergencies, what it would do if a robot taxi started driving itself where it wasn’t supposed to go, and what constraints there are on the car’s ability to traverse San Francisco’s tunnels, tight curves and steep hills. Waymo also wants to keep secret descriptions of crashes involving its driverless cars.

That’s among the information the DMV requires to determine whether to issue permits to deploy robot vehicles on public roads.

The permit was issued last year. Waymo is focusing on San Francisco, where, for the time being, its robotaxis operate under the supervision of trained human drivers.

The wider issue: how to handle the explosion in trade secret claims in an age of artificial intelligence, robot technology, the Internet of Things and pervasive data collection.

The lawsuit, filed in Sacramento County Superior Court on Jan. 21, contends that Waymo would lose out against other driverless car companies if full permit information were shared with the public.

The suit stems from a public records request to the DMV from an unidentified individual or entity seeking Waymo’s driverless deployment application — the basic filled-out form, attachments of additional material, and responses to follow-up questions from the DMV.

Before releasing the material, the DMV invited Waymo to censor sections the company believed would reveal trade secrets. The DMV sent the package to the requester with major portions blacked out, including full concealment of some of the DMV’s own questions.

Whoever asked for the material then challenged the blackouts. According to the lawsuit, the DMV contacted Waymo and invited the company to sue the agency.

“Every autonomous vehicle company has an obligation to demonstrate the safety of its technology, which is why we’ve transparently and consistently shared data on our safety readiness with the public,” Waymo spokesperson Nicholas Smith said via email when asked about the suit. “We will continue to work with the CA DMV to determine what is appropriate for us to share publicly and hope to find a resolution soon.”

Where the DMV stands on the issue remains unclear. The agency has yet to file a response to the suit and told The Los Angeles Times it won’t discuss ongoing legal matters.

In effect, the DMV is shifting responsibility to the court to determine what’s a trade secret, what’s not, and what balance should be struck between corporate claims and public interest. It can take years to resolve such lawsuits. Therefore, if any of the redacted material is made public, it probably won’t be soon.

Punting to the courts is understandable, said Sharon Sandeen, a law professor and director of the Intellectual Property Institute at Mitchell Hamline School of Law in St. Paul, Minnesota.

For government agencies subject to public records laws, “the default rule is supposed to be to disclose, unless there’s a clear exception,” said Sandeen, who researches the intersection of AI and trade secrets. But laws regarding public records and trade secrets are anything but clear, she said. Ambiguous court rulings and lack of legislative clarity have caused agencies to fear that unless they “abide by everything the company wants,” they risk being sued themselves for intellectual property theft.

Trade secrets aren’t automatically protected from public disclosure in matters that call for government regulation, she said. She points to the lengthy, detailed financial documents companies must file with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Companies presumably would prefer not to do so, she said, but they must if they’re to sell shares to the general public.

Sandeen said she is in no way opposed to protecting true trade secrets. Few lawyers dispute the idea that a legitimate trade secret should be protected by law. But trade-secret cases have mushroomed even as companies collect enormous amounts of data on the public, information they consider their own business property, leading critics to ask whether their trade-secret claims are overbroad and intentionally exaggerated.

“Corporate and government actors have pushed to transform the law of trade secrecy into one of the most — if not the most — powerful tools to ensure concealment of information,” law professors Charles Graves and Sonia Katyal wrote in an article published in the Georgetown Law Journal in June.

“The irony is that this has happened at the very same time that the opaque nature of algorithmic decision making, coupled with the new interplay between government agencies and private technologies, has created a crisis regarding access to information by journalists, regulators and others working in the public interest.”

Sandeen said a distinction should be made between trade secrets and plain secrecy.

“There needs to be leadership at the legislative and executive level that says this is the type of information we need for the public interest,” she said.

The matter will remain contentious.

In its lawsuit, Waymo says revelation of the safety information at issue would cause “a chilling effect across the industry.”

Sandeen said, “The goal of having cars moving around publicly funded streets without a driver is a real important public interest, and they shouldn’t be allowed to hide behind trade secrets to avoid scrutiny.”

Russ Mitchell

Appeals court upholds California’s net neutrality law

The court ruled 3-0 that the state law isn’t preempted at the federal level

By Kim Lyons@SocialKimLy Jan 28, 2022,

 Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

A federal appeals court on Friday ruled that California’s net neutrality law can remain in place, upholding a lower court decision. California’s 2018 law is the toughest in the country, and was signed into law a year after the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) repealed the federal Open Internet Order. That 2015 order put into place strict net neutrality rules barring internet providers from blocking or throttling legal apps and websites. It also banned prioritization of paid content by ISPs.

California’s law also bars throttling and speed lanes, and not long after the law was passed, the Department of Justice under former President Trump sued the state, arguing that the law was pre-empted by the FCC’s 2017 repeal of the federal law. That lawsuit and other legal challenges prevented the California law from taking effect, but last year the DOJ dropped its lawsuit.

Industry groups, including wireless trade association CTIA, and internet providers AT&T, Verizon, and Comcast also sued to block the California law from taking effect, but a district court judge rejected their challenge, which argued that the FCC decision should preempt the state law.

On Friday, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals voted 3-0 to uphold the lower court ruling, saying the FCC “no longer has the authority” to regulate broadband internet services since the agency had reclassified them as information services, rather than telecommunications services. “The agency, therefore, cannot preempt state action,” the court wrote in its ruling, adding that the power to control access could potentially “open the door for anticompetitive, discriminatory behavior that could disadvantage important segments of society.”

The industry groups said in a statement Friday that the “piecemeal approach” to the issue “is untenable, and Congress should codify national rules for an open Internet once and for all.”

At the moment, the FCC can’t reinstate net neutrality at the federal level, because it doesn’t have a majority; it has four members, two Democrats and two Republicans. Gigi Sohn, President Biden’s nominee to replace former FCC chairman Ajit Pai, is still awaiting Senate approval.

AMERICAN JUNKIES

Study: Older adults, Medicare, Medicaid beneficiaries at higher risk for opioid overdose

Older adults and those on Medicare and Medicaid are at higher risk for opioid overdoses than others, according to a new study. Photo by LizM/Pixabay

Jan. 28 (UPI) -- Adults age 75 years and older prescribed opioid medications for pain conditions are about three times more likely to overdose on the drugs than younger adults, based on a study related to Oregon and published Friday by JAMA Network Open.

This figure includes people who accidentally take more than the prescribed amount of the medication and those who intentionally overdose in an attempt to self-harm, the researchers said.

Compared with those covered by private healthcare insurance, Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries are up to four times more likely to overdose on prescribed opioids, the data showed.

In addition, those with mental health disorders, such as depression and substance use disorder, are at higher risk for overdose with these drugs, according to the researchers.

RELATED Opioid misuse is rising among Americans aged 55 and older

"Opioids are risky for anyone taking them," study co-author Dr. Scott Weiner told UPI in an email.

"Patients should be aware that they need to be especially careful with opioids, [particularly] older adults or those with public insurance," said Weiner, medical director of the Brigham Comprehensive Opioid Response and Education Program at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

Although the use of prescription opioid medications in pain management has declined with increased understanding of the dangers associated with them, the United States saw more than 100,000 people die from overdoses in 2020 alone.

RELATED Opioid prescriptions dispensed at retail pharmacies decline, study finds

Research suggests that misuse of the medications among adults age 55 years and older is on the rise nationally.

Weiner and his colleagues analyzed insurance claims data for nearly 237,000 adults in Oregon who were prescribed opioid pain medications starting in 2015 and tracked their health through the end of 2018.

Of those included in the study, 667, or 0.3%, experienced an opioid overdose, the data showed.

RELATED More than 100,000 people died of drug overdoses in one year in U.S., report says

Participants age 75 years and older had more than twice the rate of opioid overdoses per person per year than the next highest demographic group, those ages 18 to 24 years, and a four-fold higher rate than those ages 35 to 44 years, the researchers said.

"Prescribers should understand the longer-term risks of prescribing opioids to their patients for acute pain," Weiner said.

"This does not mean that opioids should be withheld because someone is in a higher risk group [but] that prescribers should use more caution when prescribing to them," he said.

Owners renovating old building in Washington State find century-old mural

Jan. 28 (UPI) -- A couple living in a small Washington town said they were renovating the future home of their new business when they found 60-foot murals underneath the plaster covering the walls.

Nick and Lisa Timm said the bought the building in Okanogan at the end of last year, and this week they were doing renovations at the 115-year-old former theater when they decided to peek behind the plaster on the walls.



"We were about 20 minutes from covering up the walls," Nick Timm told CNN. "I then was like 'Well, let's just look at what's behind all this plaster.'"

The Timms and their crew peeled back the plaster and discovered a 60-foot-long, 20-foot-tall landscape mural.

A crew member suggested there could be a matching mural on the opposite wall, and the theory was confirmed then the plaster was removed.

The Okanogan County Historical Society was able to dig up a 1915 newspaper clip with details about the original plans for the murals at what was then known as the Hub Theatre.

"The new improvements at the Hub include 120 feet of panoramic landscape scenery in light tans," the newspaper said.

The Timms said they want to have the murals restored, and have started a crowdfunding campaign to raise money for that.

The couple said they are hoping to have their renovations finished by March so they can open the place as a bar and local meeting space called the Red Light Bar, in honor of the town's single traffic light. 

ETHIOPIAN WAR OF AGGRESSION
Report: Severe hunger affects 40% of Tigray region
By UPI Staff

An Ethiopian refugee woman with her child from Tigray region wait to receive aid.

 File Photo by Ala Kheir/EPA-EFE

Jan. 28 (UPI) -- Severe hunger in the Tigray region -- which has been subject to constant conflict for 15 months -- affects almost 40% of all people who live there, a new assessment shows.

The United Nations World Food Program released figures on Friday stating that more than 9 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance in northern Ethiopia.
ADVERTISEMENT

While 83% of people are food insecure -- meaning they could struggle to feed themselves or their families -- almost 40% are facing severe hunger in the region.

"Families are exhausting all means to feed themselves, with three-quarters of the population using extreme coping strategies to survive," WFP reported. "Diets are increasingly impoverished as food items become unavailable and families rely almost exclusively on cereals while limiting portion sizes and the number of meals they eat each day to make whatever food is available stretch further."

RELATED Biden cites Tigray civilian deaths in call with Ethiopian PM Abiy Ahmed

The Tigray Emergency Food Security Assessment also found that 13% of children under 5 years old, and half of all pregnant and breastfeeding women are malnourished.

The results: poor pregnancy outcomes, low-birth weights, stunting and maternal death.

"WFP is doing all it can to ensure our convoys with food and medicines make it through the frontlines," said Michael Dunford, WFP's Regional Director for Eastern Africa. "But if hostilities persist, we need all the parties to the conflict to agree to a humanitarian pause and formally agreed transport corridors, so that supplies can reach the millions besieged by hunger."

Prior to conflict between the Ethiopian government and rebels in the Tigray region in 2020, 93% of people said they hadn't experienced hunger.

Now, only about 45% can say the same.

Earlier this month, President Joe Biden raised concerns over airstrikes carried out by the Ethiopian government that have caused civilian casualties. Tigray rebels claimed that more than 50 civilians were killed at the beginning of this month in an airstrike.

The United States has called for an end to the conflict and shown support for the continent with a five-day visit by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

FAA reaches deal with wireless carriers over 5G towers near airports
By Simon Druker

The FAA reached an agreement Friday with AT&T and Verizon, allowing the companies to safely activate more of their new 5G wireless towers near major U.S. airports. 

File Photo by Sergey Dolzhenko/EPA

Jan. 28 (UPI) -- The Federal Aviation Administration announced Friday it has reached a deal with Verizon and AT&T, allowing the wireless carriers to activate more of their new 5G network towers situated near airports.

The technical collaboration "will enable more aircraft to safely use key airports while also enabling more towers to deploy 5G service," according to the FAA.

This comes after the administration issued an Airworthiness Directive Tuesday, barring several models of Boeing aircraft from landing at airports where 5G wireless signals could cause interference, particularly during low-visibility approaches. The directive applies to approximately 177 airplanes in the United States and 657 worldwide, according to the FAA website.

At issue are the C-band towers in close proximity to airports, which could interfere with sensitive on-board instruments, including altimeters, which measure planes' altitude.

Both Verizon and AT&T had previously delayed activating parts of their 5G networks over FAA and airline concerns.

The companies have now "provided more precise data about the exact location of wireless transmitters and supported more thorough analysis of how 5G C-band signals interact with sensitive aircraft instruments. The FAA used this data to determine that it is possible to safely and more precisely map the size and shape of the areas around airports where 5G signals are mitigated, shrinking the areas where wireless operators are deferring their antenna activations," reads the FAA statement.

That allows them to safely turn on more of the 5G towers across major U.S. markets.

RELATED  Some foreign carriers cancel flights to U.S. over concerns about 5G rollout

This week, the administration said it has approved 90 percent of commercial aircraft to perform most low-visibility landings at airports where 5G towers are now deployed.

There are still restrictions on some rotary aircraft.

"The FAA continues to work with helicopter operators and others in the aviation community to ensure they can safely operate in areas of current and planned 5G deployment," said the FAA statement.

Living near fracking sites may shorten life spans, study suggests

By HealthDay News

A fracking drilling site operates in close proximity to a farm at the Niobrara oil shale formation in Weld County, Colorado, on May 30, 2012. 

File Photo by Gary C. Caskey/UPI | License Photo

Older people who live near or downwind of fracking sites have an increased risk of premature death, likely due to airborne contaminants from the sites, according to a new study.

"There is an urgent need to understand the causal link between living near or downwind of [unconventional oil and gas development] and adverse health effects," said study co-author Francesca Dominici. She is co-director of the Data Science Initiative at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, in Boston.

For the study, the researchers analyzed data on more than 15 million Medicare beneficiaries who lived in all major U.S. fracking exploration regions between 2001 and 2015.

Those who lived closest to fracking sites had a 2.5% higher risk of premature death than those who didn't live close to such sites -- a statistically significant difference, the study authors noted in a school news release.

The Harvard team also found that people who lived near or downwind of unconventional oil and gas development (UOGD) sites had a higher risk of premature death than those living upwind.

The findings were published Thursday in the journal Nature Energy.

"Our findings suggest the importance of considering the potential health dangers of situating UOGD near or upwind of people's homes," said lead author Longxiang Li, a postdoctoral fellow in the department of environmental health.

Senior author Petros Koutrakis, a professor of environmental sciences, noted that while UOGD is a major industrial activity in the United States, "very little is known about its public health effects."

Koutrakis said the new study is the first to link death rates to exposure to UOGD-related air pollutants.

About 17.6 million Americans live within 6/10 of a mile of at least one active fracking site.

Previous research has linked fracking to increased human exposure to harmful substances in the air and water. It has also linked exposure to fracking with pregnancy, lung, heart and cancer risks.

But little was known about whether fracking was associated with increased risk of premature death in seniors, or how it might increase that risk.

More information

For more about fracking and health, visit the U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.

Copyright © 2021 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

NASA, Boeing, UCF to study zero-carbon ammonia jet fuel
By Paul Brinkmann


NASA is researching the feasibility of using ammonia as jet fuel, including how commercial airline fleets could be converted for its use -- though it may take decades to do so. 

Photo courtesy of Boeing

ORLANDO, Fla., Jan. 28 (UPI) -- New efforts are emerging to study ammonia as a clean, climate-friendly jet fuel, led by the University of Central Florida with a $10 million contract from NASA and cooperation from Boeing.

Known to most people as an ingredient in glass cleaners, ammonia in a pure form comprises three hydrogen atoms and one nitrogen atom.

At high temperatures, hydrogen can be released from ammonia to create hydrogen fuel, according to researchers working on the study.

But NASA wants research to look at the big picture of using ammonia commercially, how the commercial airline fleets could transition to ammonia fuel and what the overall environmental impact would be, according to the agency.

The fuel research is one of many green aviation experiments NASA is pursuing, including an upcoming test flight of an all-electric plane, the X-57 Maxwell.

Burning hydrogen as fuel results in little or no harmful emissions, Jay Kapat, professor of engineering at UCF, told UPI in an interview. Traditional jet fuel, on the other hand, produces carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, particulates and other harmful emissions.

"There's a lot of attention given to hydrogen fuel today. But the bottom line is, ammonia can be stored more easily in a liquid form than hydrogen, which must be supercooled in cryogenic chambers," said Kapat, who is also director of UCF's Center for Advanced Turbomachinery and Energy Research.

"While a jet is in flight, the chill of the high altitude alone would keep it chilled adequately," he said.

NASA awarded UCF a five-year contract in December, and the university recently announced a larger team that will study ammonia, engines and fueling systems at airports.

Other groups participating are Georgia Tech, Purdue University in Indiana, Boeing, General Electric, Texas-based Southwest Research Institute, the Greater Orlando Aviation Authority and Pennsylvania-based software company ANSYS.



"We have a good concept," Kapat says. "And by having our partners in industry we know we'll fine tune and be ready for technology transition, so we can provide a greener future for our children."

If all goes well, Kapat hopes to have another five years to run a pilot program, possibly in Orlando. After that, he thinks it could be 2040 or 2050 before commercial fleets would adopt ammonia fuel broadly.

"This isn't something your plane will be using anytime soon, but we hope to spur it along," he said.

The process of releasing hydrogen from ammonia provides cooling, which would be an added benefit, Kapat said, that would help to keep engine turbines from overheating.

Southwest Research Institute will focus on the economics of how ammonia fuel use could be scaled for broader use, said Joshua Schmitt, senior research engineer at the institute.

"We have a decent amount of experience in aviation, in vehicle-based technologies," Schmitt said. "We even have large facilities on campus where we do testing with this type of thing, including ammonia, the intended fuel."

Ammonia doesn't come without risks, because it is flammable, but it is more similar to jet fuel than supercooled liquid hydrogen, he said.

"There already are safety systems in place to handle jet fuel," Schmitt said. "So it would really be about fitting ammonia into the existing safety systems and what new safety systems would need to be designed.

For now, the project is focused on gaining familiarity with ammonia as a fuel and what hazards and benefits it might present, he said.

China, Russia to start building lunar research station by 2026
By Simon Druker


China said Friday it will sign a deal with Russia by the end 

of the year that will see the two countries develop a joint facility on the moon. 

Pat Benic/UPI | License Photo

Jan. 28 (UPI) -- China said Friday that it expects to sign a space agreement with Russia by the end of this year that will include construction of a joint lunar research facility.

"We are intensively engaged in negotiations and have basically reached a consensus. The agreement is quite possible to be signed as soon as possible this year," China National Space Administration Vice Administrator Wu Yanhua told a Friday news conference, the Eurasian Times said.

The countries aim to begin construction of the International Lunar Research Station by 2026 and have basic infrastructure finished by 2035. It will be capable of conducting multidisciplinary research activities. The construction area will be chosen before 2025.

This comes on the same day the China National Space Administration released a white paper outlining the immediate future of the country's space program, as well as its recent accomplishments.

"The space industry is a critical element of the overall national strategy, and China upholds the principle of exploration and utilization of outer space for peaceful purposes," the paper states.

A future base also could include a reserve spacecraft capable of taking off from the moon's surface, Russia's Sputnik News Agency reported Tuesday.

"The possibility of some kind of reserve lunar ascent/descent vehicle is one new and important idea. And things will be more calm on the moon [for cosmonauts] if there is a reserve ship which can take off," retired cosmonaut Vladimir Solovyev told the agency.

It also reported member states of the European Space Agency have been invited to participate in the facility's development. The agency said it has not yet reached a decision.

In September, China and Russia jointly hosted a closed-door workshop on the lunar station. Experts from France, Italy, the Netherlands, Germany, Malaysia, Thailand also were invited.

Stormy Daniels testifies about supernatural interests in Michael Avenatti trial

CHALLENGING HER CREDIBILITY, 

EXCEPT GOD IS SUPERNATURAL TOO
By Danielle Haynes

Stormy Daniels walks with her former lawyer, Michael Avenatti, on April 16, 2018. Avenatti, who's representing himself in trial on wire fraud charges, cross examined Daniels on Friday.

 John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo


Jan. 28 (UPI) -- California lawyer Michael Avenatti cross examined his former client, former adult film star Stormy Daniels, during his trial Friday on wire fraud charges.

He asked her about her experiences with the supernatural in an apparent bid to question her credibility.

Avenatti, who pleaded not guilty to federal wire fraud and aggravated identity theft, took over his own representation Tuesday in his Manhattan trial. He's accused of impersonating Daniels and convincing her literary agent to send him nearly $300,000 in publisher's payments intended for her.

Avenatti said Daniels agreed to giving him part of her book advance in exchange for him representing her in a case involving allegations she had a sexual relationship with former President Donald Trump.

Daniels, born Stephanie Cliffords, began her testimony Thursday, and on Friday, it was Avenatti's turn to cross examine her. He asked her about supernatural visions she's had and her ability to speak with ghosts.

"How do you speak with the dead?" he asked.

"I don't know. It just happens sometimes," she responded, adding that she sometimes uses cards and meditation to help.

Daniels testified that she spoke with a doll named "Susan," a subject that appears in her documentary project Spooky Babes.

Avenatti also asked whether a "dark entity" had entered her home.

"That's what I was told by a medium," Daniels said.

At the end of Friday's testimony, Avenatti told the court he will likely testify in his own defense next week.

EXPLAINER: Who uses Florida-Caribbean smuggling routes?

By ADRIANA GOMEZ LICON

U.S. Coast Guard Captain Jo-Ann Burdian, foreground, speaks along with Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent in Charge in Miami Anthony Salisbury, rear, during a news conference, Thursday, Jan. 27, 2022, at Coast Guard Sector Miami in Miami Beach, Fla. The Coast Guard says it has found four more bodies in its search for dozens of migrants lost at sea off Florida, for a total of five bodies. The maritime security agency said Thursday that it also plans to call off its active search for survivors at sunset if it doesn't receive any new information. (AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee)

MIAMI (AP) — Little is known about the 40 people believed to have been aboard a boat that capsized and was found this week near Florida’s coast with just one survivor. But they were on a route often traveled by migrants trying to enter the U.S. clandestinely, and authorities suspect the trip was organized by smugglers.

Apprehensions of migrants in the Florida-Caribbean region appear to be on pace to surpass numbers from last year, with more Cubans and Haitians taking to sea despite the dangers and stricter U.S. refugee policies.

The sole survivor told a good Samaritan and authorities that the boat capsized late Saturday after he and 39 others had set out for Florida from Bimini, a chain of islands in the Bahamas about 55 miles (88 kilometers) east of Miami.

Officials say the Bahamas is a common route for smuggling migrants. Both the Coast Guard and Homeland Security say they are treating this as a human smuggling case.

WHY THE BAHAMAS?

The Bahamas is seen as a steppingstone to reach Florida and the United States.

For the most part, the migrants are from Haiti and Cuba, but the Royal Bahamas Defense Force has reported apprehending migrants from other parts of the world, including from Colombia and Ecuador.

Refugee aid groups say some migrants opt for the longer route to avoid the increasing law enforcement along the Florida Straits. “They may island hop,” said Randy McGrorty, executive director of Catholic Legal Services.

The defense force said that last Friday it rescued 31 migrants who were on another overcrowded boat that also capsized. Those migrants had also departed from Bimini.

The Bahamas and nearby Turks and Caicos Islands have stepped up their anti-smuggling enforcement efforts in cooperation with the Coast Guard in recent years.

HOW MANY ARE MAKING THE JOURNEY?

From Oct. 1, 2020, to Sept. 30 of last year, the Coast Guard says that in the region that includes Florida and the Caribbean its crews apprehended 838 Cubans; 1,527 Haitians; and 742 Dominicans.

In less than four months since last October, crews have apprehended 686 Cubans; 802 Haitians and 685 Dominicans.

In May, a Canadian man was sentenced to two years and eight months in prison in U.S. federal court for his role in an operation that smuggled people from Sri Lanka by plane to Haiti, then by boat to the Turks and Caicos and the Bahamas to South Florida.

The total number of people making the journey is impossible to know as many try to arrive undetected and thousands have died over the years.

WHY ARE THEY COMING?

Reasons vary, with some migrants seeking better economic opportunity and some escaping political turbulence or violence.

Cuba is facing an economic crisis that has been exacerbated by the pandemic, increased U.S. sanctions and cutbacks in aid from Venezuela. The crisis has led to shortages in many goods and a series of protests that shook the island on July 11.

Legal ways to leave Cuba were strained by former President Donald Trump’s near-closure of the U.S. Embassy in 2017. The United States had been providing 22,000 visas a year to Cuba for two decades until 2017. And President Joe Biden has not resumed dialogue with the communist nation.

McGrorty, of Catholic Legal Services, says his office is seeing “very meritorious asylum claims.”

In Haiti, violence has spiked since the July assassination of President Jovenel Moise. The political instability and a 7.2 magnitude earthquake in August have deepened a growing humanitarian crisis in the impoverished Caribbean nation.

CAN THEY STAY?

The U.S. Coast Guard often repatriates people found at sea; it did so earlier this month when it sent back 119 Cuban migrants.

At the beginning of 2017, President Barack Obama eliminated a policy known as “wet foot-dry foot” that allowed Cubans who reached U.S. shores to remain, usually as refugees, while those caught at sea were sent back.

Typically Cubans would obtain parole cards that allowed them to apply for residency a year afterward. But right now the system is in disarray, with lawsuits challenging how the government treats Cuban asylum seekers. A 56-year-old law has given Cubans a virtually guaranteed path to legal residency and eventual citizenship.

Thousands of Cubans are subject of deportation, but Immigration and Customs Enforcement still lists the communist nation as uncooperative or “recalcitrant” in accepting deportees.

The U.S. government has been called out for expelling thousands of Haitians. A U.N. report estimated about 9,000 Haitians were expelled between Sept. 19, 2021, and late November. Most had arrived at the U.S.-Mexico border in September.

Activists urge athletes to speak out at Beijing Olympics


1 of 3

Human right groups gather on the United Nations international Human Rights Day, Friday, Dec. 10, 2021, to call for a boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics 2022 in front of the Bank of China building in Taipei, Taiwan. Human rights activists issued a call to action against the Beijing Olympics on Friday, Jan. 28, 2022 imploring athletes and sponsors to speak out against what they call the "genocide games."

 (AP Photo/Chiang Ying-ying, File)


BEIJING (AP) — Human rights activists issued a call to action against the Beijing Olympics on Friday, imploring athletes and sponsors to speak out against what they call the “genocide games.”

Speaking at an online press conference organized by the rights group Human Rights Watch, activists representing Chinese dissidents and the minority Uyghur and Tibetan populations urged international attendants to voice their opposition to China’s hosting of the Games, which begin next week.

“The 2022 Winter Olympics will be remembered as the genocide games,” said Teng Biao, a former human rights activist in China who is now a visiting professor at the University of Chicago.

“The CCP’s purpose is to exactly turn the sports arena into a stage for political legitimacy and a tool to whitewash all those atrocities,” he added, referring to the ruling Chinese Communist Party.

China’s crackdown under hardline ruler Xi Jinping has been felt across wide swaths of society. Hong Kong authorities crushed anti-government protests in the city in 2019, and the central government in Beijing passed a national security law aimed at stifling dissent, leading to the arrest of activists and disbandment of civil society groups.

Meanwhile, in the country’s western region of Xinjiang, an estimated 1 million people or more — most of them Uyghurs — have been confined in reeducation camps in recent years, according to researchers.

An independent, unofficial body set up by a prominent British barrister to assess evidence on China’s alleged rights abuses against the Uyghur people concluded in December that the Chinese government committed genocide. China has consistently denied any human rights abuses in the region and has said it carried out its actions to counter extremism in the region in order to ensure people’s safety.

China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin has hit back at the rights group for its continued calls to boycott the Olympics, saying that “the so-called human rights group is biased against China and keen on making mischief. Lies and rumors it fabricated are unpopular. Its egregious acts that harm the Olympic cause will never succeed.”

The Foreign Ministry has also said the Olympics should not be politicized. Yet the competition is already facing a diplomatic boycott led by the U.S., whose relationship with China has nosedived in the past few years.

Activists have failed to achieve a full boycott of the games, but have continued to speak out.

“Your silence is their strength. This is what they want more than anything: that the world will play by China’s rules, that we will follow China’s lead, that we will look away from these atrocities and crimes for the sake of business as usual,” said Lhadon Tethong, director of the Tibet Action Institute, at the press conference Friday.

She appealed directly to athletes from the U.S., UK, France and others to speak.

“I personally believe that you should use your platform and your privilege and this historic opportunity. You have to speak out against the wave of genocide,” she said.

—-

Associated Press video journalist Sam McNeil contributed to this report from Beijing.